Broken Bones
by Mystic25
Summary: A piece, set in Season 5. Of what would happen if Sam Winchester were raped, and had to tell his brother, and what would result. RATING: M for RAPE AND VIOLENCE.Not Wincest though.


"Broken Bones"

Author: Mystic25

A piece, set in Season 5. Of what would happen if Sam Winchester were raped, and had to tell his brother, and what would result.

Disclaimer: "Supernatural" belongs to Eric Kripke, and the CW. And, sadly, very unfortunately, Jared Padalecki belongs to Genevieve Cortease-Padalecki, but perhaps, she's willing to strike some sort of loose deal with me…

Rating: M for coarse language, rape, and violence.

A/N: I've seen a few fics of Sam being raped, and many were good (as "good" as writing about being raped and tortured can be.) I just still found something lacking. It's not just Dean being over protective, or Sam being completely passive and weak. Not Wincest, not my thing, just, simply, and not maybe no simply, two brothers. My first Supernatural fic, yay! Been a fan for a while.

A/N #2: The title is the name of a song by Rev Theory, the lyrics, of which fit Dean and Sam completely.

Dedication: To Soncrica. So fun that I found someone who is obsessed with Supernatural (and Sam Winchester:)) as much as I am.

XXXXXXXX

"_Every minute you spend with someone gives them a part of your life, and takes part of theirs." _

-Ally Condie Matched

"_I'm gonna say this one time, you make a move on him, you'll be dead before you hit the ground, you understand me? I mean, do I make myself clear?" _

-Dean Winchester "Supernatural" Episode: "Croatoan"

XXXXXXXXX

The seedy motel flashed with a neon sign that, like many countless others across the American countryside, flashed proudly the name it was given. In this case the name was: "Low And Lazy" with a picture of a smiling cowboy in a ten gallon hat below it, still smiling, even though someone had scratched the letters : 'B; 'S' 'L' and 'E' in between their neon glow, so it read in a more colorful manner: "Blow and Sleazy."

An outdated soda machine that still sold pink cans of Tab sat rusting against the long concrete wall that boasted the doors to the rooms, giving the hotel guests the fabulous view of the truck stop gas station and the two lane highway in front of it.

A figure was standing in front of this machine, shoving a rumpled one dollar bill into the slot. Tall, built, dressed in a button down pinstripe shirt and camel colored leather jacket, and jeans, he was handsome under the dying light of the naked bulbs suspended over his head. But, Sam Winchester never gave much thought into being "handsome." He wasn't a stupid one; he'd seen the way women looked at him, the way it pissed of his brother because they weren't looking his way. But, it was past one in the morning, he and Dean had been working a case in this small town just outside of Raleigh, North Carolina and was reduced to drinking soda that was most likely dated before he was born. Right now Sam's thoughts were only on two things: _Crappy soda first, then crappy bed._

The Tab fell from the machine with a thud, Sam bent down to retrieve it, popping the top, sipping as he stood back up to his full height, wishing that it were beer instead. The small town of Roughtington, North Carolina (Dean was all over that one: "bet the women of this town really know how to have a good time.") had been haunted by an alleged spirit that would terrorize it's victims at roadside hotels (surprisingly for a town with a population of 320 people, they had seven such hotels), gutting them all over the walls. As it turned out, all these hotels were built from the same construction company. One where, five years ago, a worker had fought another because he slept with his wife. This fight resulted in the first man being knocked out against the side of a truck and killed by a massive brain hemorrhage. The first man panicked, and disposed of his body into a cement mixer. The legend was supposed to go, that the man's spirit killed the hotel guests in revenge because of his grisly end. It didn't pan out; both Dean and Sam were quick to pick up on that. In the first place, the ghost had no qualms with the hotel guests, and unless the spirit latched on to the cement itself, it would have only haunted the hotel where it died. And secondly, all the victims died by obvious human involvement, five being shot, and one being stabbed in the back. The hunt didn't pan out, but the murders were solved. A group, a very angry group of local hot headed young men, had committed the murders, men who wanted to instill fear on what they considered to be the idiotic population of their town. They were arrested by the local Police, two of them managing to evade capture by tearing into the thick evergreen forests that grew all around the small town.

The local reporter of the paper was convinced that the brothers were "heroes" for stopping the men, and wanted to do a full spread column of them in the paper. Of course they refused, though Dean did flash a few sexy smiles for the camera, whose film Sam promptly stole five minutes later, calling his brother an "idiot."

An owl hooted somewhere in the trees that Sam couldn't see because of the huge neon sign that hung over his head. He didn't think anything off it, sipping the unusually ripe tasting Tab, and turning to walk back down the long cement slab hallway to the room he and Dean had rented for the night. The rooms were charged by the hour, and the manager kept giving Dean a "thumbs up" look with backwards glances at Sam while they were signing in. Sam had nothing against gay men; he had several gay friends in Stanford. But there was something very creepy about being mistaken for your own brother's lover.

The owl hooted again, and then came the sound of footsteps behind him. Sam stopped walking, his muscles tensed. The days of moving to the side to let the approaching people behind you pass you left the day Dean got him from his dorm room. Sam's reflexives were too ingrained now, he turned, his hand went to the back of his jacket, where had tucked a black .45 Caliber Vector into the waistband of his pants. He turned more; hand on the butt of the gun, not drawing it, because he would be seriously screwed if it turned out to be just some old lady returning to her room with an ice bucket.

Something slammed into him, smashing him up against the wall of the motel, winding him.

"Where do you think you're going you shit?"

The voice sounded familiar, but a new kind of familiar, like he had heard it only recently. But Sam didn't think on that for long, his hand reached for the gun, at the same time he threw the other man off him. The figure stumbled backwards at the same moment. But, it took another moment for Sam to realize that he had grabbed at nothing but air; and he had his own gun cocked in his face. A face and a voice he knew now, it was one of the two men who had fled into the woods after the arrests.

The skinny figure dressed in a dirty flannel shirt and torn jeans spat the blood from his mouth that Sam's maneuver of throwing him off had produced. "You're going to pay for that you dick, that and getting my boys arrested!"

"You're the dick, and you're _boys_ got what they deserved!" Sam spat, knowing it was a pretty stupid thing to say to someone who had a gun turned on you, but, the sight of the man who had dragged he and Dean out there, had murdered all those innocent people, seriously pissed him off. "So why don't you just give me my gun so you don't hurt yourself?"

The man laughed, a dry, leering kind of laugh that made your skin crawl to hear it. "You're a feisty one. Bet you and that other dickless whore have good times in the dark. I ain't into that kind of blasphemy," he smiled slow and disgusting, watching Sam's anger rise, at everything wrong with what the man was saying. "But you are pretty little abomination out here in the dark, and I ain't had my retribution yet-" He gasped as Sam's fist connected with the side of his head so fast that he didn't have time to react with the gun in his hand. It fell to the ground and slid across the pavement out of reach of either of them. Sam punched the man again with a hard left cross, diving sideways a second later for his gun. His right shoulder hit the pavement hard, and he felt a pop and then a stabbing pain from a dislocation.

But, he still grabbed the gun in his good hand and took aim, hand on the trigger. A blinding pain slammed into the back of his head, disorienting him, making him drop the gun like useless trash to the ground. The blow was a crushing one, he was barely consciousness. But, he could still hear, and another, deeper voice sounded above him:

"You're going to pay dearly for that."

Whatever was said next, Sam didn't hear, because consciousness had left him.

XXXXX

Sam awoke to more pain. At first, it seemed to come from everywhere, like hot serrated knives scraping all over his body slowly. His vision was blurred, most likely from the head trauma; he had enough of them over the years to know how they felt. He turned his head, or tried too, he found himself unable to move very far, finally finding the source for his pain. His arms were lashed together by thick rope above his head; sending stabbing pain to his already separated right shoulder.

The air was cold. He heard the sound of cars passing by at regular intervals through a poorly insulated window, he could smell the same musty smell he noticed coming from the hotel linens in he and Dean's room. He was still in the hotel, somewhere in some other room. Tied up by an insane psychopath.

_Great, this on top of bad Tab._ Sam had faced and killed demons, ghosts, vampires, werewolves, he wasn't that afraid of two hotheads. But that didn't mean he _wasn't_ afraid at all. Dean had put it so eloquently many times: "_Demons I get, but humans…"_ He had seen what average people could do to each other, what crazy people could do. And here he was, with one of them.

A face came into view, the same moment tepid water was splashed him in the face. "Wakey, wakey pretty boy! You don't want to sleep during all the fun."

Sam spat out the water, groaning internally at the pain in his shoulder. Gritting his teeth, he glared as best he could through blurred vision at the skinny man in front of him: "What the hell do you want?"

The sting of a backhanded blow hit him across the face, splitting open his lip. Blood ran warm down his chin, dripping onto the floor. "Watch your mouth boy, or he won't make this pleasant."

_He?_ Sam then remembered the second voice, the deeper one belonging to the other man's accomplice who had torn off into the woods with him. _But, where was 'he'?_

"I'm only asking this one more time," Sam's anger was clear even through the haze of the pain from all his injuries, the blood still flowing freely down his busted lip. "What. Do. You. Want?"

"Isn't it obvious?" The deeper came from behind him, there was hot breath blowing in his ear. "We want you." There was a jerk, he felt himself being grabbed at from behind. He fought, but he realized that he could get very far because he was pinned hard against a wall for the second time. The cold air suddenly became blocked by something warm, something that reeked, of sweat.

Sam suddenly realized why he was cold; he was naked from the waist down. He struggled harder in his bonds now, mind screaming. "NO! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" His words were muffled by a sock that was shoved into his mouth.

"I said, watch your mouth!" The skinny man ordered.

Sam thrashed around, trying to see what was going on, but his head was roughly slammed into the wall, making stars dance in front of him.

"My man is right," the deeper voice said in a voice that whispered hot and rancid by his ear. "If you don't watch your stupid little mouth, I won't make this pleasurable-"

There was a pause, and in that pause Sam felt something ripping into him, he screamed. Even caught up in the sock gagging him, the scream was agony.

"At least pleasurable for me." The deep voice smiled from behind him, pushing harder. "Your kind just needs to learn, that your place will always be submissive."

Sam continued to scream into the gag. The pain was brutal, tearing. Blood was running down his legs, he felt it; vomit was in his mouth, staining the sock there, having nowhere else to go.

"I'm doing you a favor bitch, you need to understand how truly sick you really are." the sound of the man's voice being strained as he talked repulsed Sam, because he could feel every moment of the other man's exertion.

He felt the urge to pass out at one point, but he fought it. After fighting with almost every evil and supernatural creature and surviving, he was _not_ going to die here, half naked, in a squalid little hotel room in some godforsaken town. His mind screamed for demon blood, for the power it brought him, to rip these men apart. But, he had given it up months ago, there was no psychic power that would protect him now, there was just him, only him.

He yanked hard on the bonds at his arms, his shoulder screamed in pain, but he continued to pull, harder, and harder, until finally the cheaply constructed support column they had tied him to had broken apart, and he fell to the ground.

He felt himself being pulled out of as he hit the thinly padded carpet. He pulled at the rope on his wrists, feeling a bone snap in his little finger at the force he was using, but the ropes were too tight and did give way completely. Adrenaline was coursing through his veins now. He saw one of the men come at him. He lunged at the deep voice, throwing him against the same wall he used on him, breaking his head against the drywall. The man fell from the blow, dropping to the floor.

There wasn't an inch left on Sam's body that didn't feel pain, it was like a fire burning him, like a voice that screamed in his ears. But still, he moved like a man who knew none of this, his mind wrapping around a single phrase: _Get out._ He tore at the rope around his wrists with his teeth, tasting the hot metallic taste of his own blood in his mouth. The rope finally fell away, leaving his hands free. His next move was instantaneous. He searched for his gun, his vision was dark, but, he caught a glimpse of light shining off the black handle of his Vector, lying under a puke green blanket that hung off a queen sized bed.

The two men had dropped it there after dragging Sam back to the room and tying him up. Because they had bound and gagged him, they weren't planning to use it, at least not use it traditionally. They were after revenge, but it wasn't what really fueled them. They were truly insane; they were torturing Sam for the sheer pleasure of hearing him scream.

Sam clawed his way across the floor to his gun, his left hand grasped the heavy metal barrel; he clicked a round inside the chamber. His breath tore away from him as a huge hand latched around his neck, lifting him up off the ground like a hangman's noose. Sam gasped, his lungs pleaded for air.

"You fuckin' son-of-a-bitch!" the deep voice of one of the nameless man applied stronger pressure causing Sam's eyes to roll back into his head. "What the fuck do you think you can do? You brought this on yourself!"

Sam was on the verge of passing out, but he clung to his last moments of consciousness. His left hand was still grasping loosely, the handle of his gun; he dragged sweat soaked fingers up until his pointer settled on the pressure point of the trigger. He raised the gun and squeezed.

The echo of a fired round tore through the air, the man screamed, releasing Sam to clutching at the gunshot wound that pooled a dark red stain on his shoulder.

Air returned to Sam's lungs, he gasped like he had been pulled drowning from a tidal wave. His body was too weak to bear his weight, and he fell, hard onto the floor. His consciousness ended.

XXXXXX

Blackness began to fade away like melting ice. Sam was awake, he felt the roughness of the carpet underneath his face, but he didn't want to feel anything. The consciousness brought with it, pain, pain everywhere that made him gasp for every single breath. He could smell the disgusting mold emitting from the carpet padding that stayed permanently wet because the hotel would always flood when it rained. He pushed himself up on his hands, crying out a second later, as he remembered his injured shoulder, remembered it by it not taking his weight, and almost blinding him in agony.

He writhed, drawing the shoulder protectively to his chest, pulling himself up more slowly with his uninjured arm. His head pounded, his whole body pounded. Through a cloud of hazed dizziness, he swept his eyes across the room, looking into the darkness, listening. The only sounds he could hear were that of the air conditioner whirring from the condenser that sat on a block right outside the door, and that of his own gasped breathing.

He could feel a puddle of damp, warm, blood under him on the carpet. But, the blood wasn't his. Even awash in his own injuries Sam knew that, because he was aware, very distinctly, of where he was bleeding. The blood was from the man he had shot, it trailed in red dots to the peeling painted door of the only exit to the room. Through the poorly insulated window traffic rolled by the stretch of highway, the blare of a semi truck's horn cut through the night.

He felt trickles of sweat pour off him, making him shiver in the air conditioned room, but his body was coursing on too much adrenaline to allow shock to fully enter it. The taste of old vomit coated his mouth, he spat, looking around the darkness for his gun, not knowing if he was really alone, or if his attackers were hiding, waiting to go again. There was only one tiny lamp lit, casting everything in gray light and blurry definition. Sam felt along the filthy carpet, grabbing at something in front of him, thinking it to be his gun. But, his hand came back with the black remote from the television.

He threw it down in an angered garbled cry, pulling himself forward, feeling again for his weapon. If these men were still actually in the room, he was not going to be caught unaware again. His hands touched fabric; he found his fingers closing on his own boxers and jeans. His phone wasn't among the pile; he had laid it on the nightstand before going outside for a soda, an action he cursed himself now about. But, the curse was a small one, compared to the huge screaming in his head upon finding his clothes in a heaped pile: _I'm naked, those men-I'm nakedI'mnakedI'mnaked._

There was a pounding on the door, Sam jumped at the noise. Of all the things he had expected to hear, he didn't expect that, even though he knew the sound of his gunshot had carried. He just didn't expect anyone to care about what happened to people who rented rooms by the hour.

"What's going on in there?" it was the voice of the manager, and he _did_ have concern in it. But, it wasn't the concern of someone who cared about the safety of others, it was the concern of a man who cared about having cops showing up at his hotel and arresting all his customers for what they were doing behind their doors.

There was a louder pounding. "Anybody in there?" The voice was familiar, but one that Sam knew much longer than just recently, knew since the moment his brain allowed him to remember sounds.

_Dean._ Years of what the brothers dealt with, and what they did when they found them had brought them both to a point where they slept on a trigger, always on alert to any unnatural sounds.

"If you can hear me in there, then answer me!"

Dean's cry sent Sam into a panic; he didn't want his brother to find him, not like this. He grabbed at his jeans, his right arm hung at a useless angle beside him, but he still moved it to get back into his pants, and when the pain of moving it at all hit, he screamed.

From outside the door Dean pulled away like he had been electrocuted. The gunshot had shocked him awake, he barely had time to register that Sam wasn't in the room, as he grabbed his silver Beretta off the nightstand and ran out the door. But, every conscious thought in him was flung back to Sam when he heard that scream.

"Sam?"

The door was kicked in a second later, slamming against the wall with a loud crash. Sam heard Dean step over the threshold, calling his name again: "Sam?"

The room was now bathed in the light from the street lamps that lined the sidewalk outside. This new source of light only added a small fraction of visibility to the darkness. Bu, even with all the violence the room had just seen, nothing besides the concrete Sam had knocked down had been moved out of place from its original spot. Which mean that there was nothing to block the sight of Sam lying beaten on the floor from Dean's eyes.

"SAM!" Dean's scream was so loud that it made the stray dogs that hung outside to nose around in the overflowing trashcans bark in shocked alarm. Dean tore into the room and dropped beside Sam in a single movement.

"Sam!" Sam felt Dean's hands on his neck, lifting up his head. "Oh my god-"

Behind both brothers, the manager stood there in complete shock. "Holy shit!"

Sam did not want Dean to find him like this, not here in the floor, not after what had just happened. But, all those feelings had vanished the moment he felt Dean touching him, heard him say his name. His brain switched into the place that only his brother could reach.

"Dean-" Sam's voice was dry, weak to even his own ears.

"Holy _fucking_ shit man!" the manager cried out again, his arms raised above his head to his receding black hairline. He knew bad things went down all the time in his hotel, he just preferred not to see it, to steam clean the evidence from the carpets once everyone inside had cleared out.

Dean snapped his head to the manager: "Shut the hell up goddamnit!" His snarl silenced the man's ramblings. Dean turned back to Sam, he looked terrible, even in the half light Dean could see it. "Where are you hurt?"

Sam's consciousness was beginning to slip again, his head lolled in Dean's hands.

"SAMMY!" Dean shook him, taking his face in his hands.

Sam's eyes snapped back open, he gasped: "My shoulder-"

Dean could see the unnatural, crooked angle of Sam's right shoulder, the way it was just hanging limp at his side. "Who did this to you?" Dean's voice was deadly angry.

Sam gasped again as his stomach twisted in a knot, the shock that had been put off earlier coming at him with tremendous force. His stomach untwisted painfully, and he vomited.

Dean jumped back in alarm, afraid of how badly Sam was hurt if he was reacting this way. "Whoa, whoa whoa, hey, come on, we're going to get you out of here." He grabbed Sam's uninjured shoulder and pulled him to his feet, draping it over his own shoulders.

Sam made it halfway up to a standing position, but his legs buckled before he reached his full height, and he started sliding back down.

Dean felt him fall, he drew his arm tighter for more support. "Sam!-"

"Dean," Sam groaned, the action of standing had rocked a pulsating pain to his lower body. "I don't think I can walk."

"It's okay, I got you," Dean slid a hand across Sam's waist, shifting his weight.

Sam felt the change in position. "Dean, no, you can't carry me-"

"Watch me," Dean returned. He was four inches shorter and 40 pounds smaller than Sam. But, this was his little brother, he was hurt, the adrenaline was coursing through his veins. He lifted Sam's six foot two frame into his arms.

"What the hell happened to him?" The manager was as tactless as the dirty men who would take call girls and prostitutes into their rooms at his hotel, claiming them to be "nieces" or, even more disgustingly, "daughters."

"Just back the hell up!" Dean screamed. He carried Sam out the door- pushing the manager aside with his movement- and down the long outside hallway.

A woman wearing a black laced teddy, and a robe so sheer it didn't cover up anything in the slightest poked her head out of one of the rooms. Her eyes widened when she saw Dean walk by with Sam."What the hell?"

"Close the damn door and go back inside!" Dean barked at her. The woman's face registered terror; she slammed the door shut quickly. Dean couldn't see his own expression, but it was frightening.

Sam's body was almost completely limp against Dean. He had no energy to hold onto his brother. His eyes were closed; pain was attacking his body like a malevolent force, making breathing hard.

"Hang in there Sammy, you hear me!" Even with all Sam's extra weight, Dean was almost running down the long concrete hallways. A random door would open every foot, as people poked their heads out to see what was going on. Dean kept his mouth shut all those times, his focus on getting Sam back to their room taking precedent over everything else.

Dean finally made it back to their hotel room. He kicked open the door, moving through the darkness until he reached one of the two queen beds. He laid Sam down as carefully as he was able too. He switched on the cheaply made Tiffany lamp that sat on an unpainted particle board nightstand.

Sam was curled on the bed on his left side, his dislocated shoulder pulled tightly to his chest. The pain was now ranking right up there with being possessed by a demon and being made to stab yourself repeatedly while you could do nothing but scream. He raised his head off the bed, trying to find Dean in the room.

"Dean-"

"I'm here Sammy," there was a sound of footsteps, then Sam felt Dean slide an arm under him, pulling him up, and press something into his left hand. "Here, drink this."

Sam's fingers closed around a highball glass, a trickle of warm, heady smelling, liquor spilled out onto his fingers. Dean would never consider taking Sam to a hospital, and Sam would never ask him too. Hospitals asked too many questions, they took records. The last few years Dean and Sam would patch up their own injuries themselves, learning how to set broken bones with chair legs, and stop bleeding with duct tape and strips of torn hotel sheets.

Sam swallowed it all in one gulp, choking at the sting of the alcohol burning down his throat. "What the hell was that?" he choked again.

"Sorry dude," Dean apologized. "It's all the mini bar had, Jack Daniels and Sky Vodka." He lowered Sam back down onto the bed, and took the three steps over to the second queen bed, pulling the sheet off the mattress, tearing it into strips. The longest strip he rolled into a long tight bundle. All the time he was doing that, he never took his eyes off Sam. "You feeling it yet?"

Sam gave a small pained nod. "Yeah," he could feel the warmth of the liquors spreading down his body, the pain was still screaming at him, but the alcohol was making his mind detach itself from it. "Yeah, it's starting to kick in. Just don't ever order that for me at a bar."

"Duly noted," Dean stepped back over to the bed, winding the torn strip of sheet in his hands. "Here," held the sheet up in front of Sam. "Bite down on this."

Sam saw the rag hovering over his face.

"_I said watch your mouth!" the sock was shoved into his mouth, so far back that he choked. He was pushed into; he could smell his own rancid vomit that began soaking into the cotton._

Sam felt his breathing increase. "No." He tried to level it, to slow it down.

"Come on man, now's not the time to cowboy up alright?" Dean insisted, lowering the rag closer. "This is gonna hurt like hell."

"I SAID NO!" Sam screamed, a scream that was too strong for his weakened body to handle. He convulsed back onto the mattress.

"_Fucking little bitch!" Semen was beginning to pool down the back his legs as fast as the blood. "Stop enjoying it!"_

"SAMMY!" Dean grabbed his face in his hands again, his brother's eyes were screwed tight, the arteries in his neck protruding at how rigid he was holding himself. "Damnit, stay with me! Sam!"

"Dean-" Sam's breathing was erratic, his voice was shattering, he kept trying to shove it back down, to not let Dean see. Dean couldn't know, he couldn't, Sam knew what would happen if Dean knew. "I can't. Please-"

Dean could hear the raw panic in Sam's voice, as much as he joked about Sam's lack of testosterone he knew his brother. Sam had grown into a man that could handle things that would send any one else running to an institution in a psychotic breakdown. Something bad had happened to him tonight, something that left Dean feeling both scared and pissed as hell. Scared for Sam, and pissed as hell at whoever dared do this to his brother. But, Sam would always come first for Dean, so it was the fear that crept up on him.

"Okay, Sammy, it's okay, I've got you," Dean reassured. "We'll do it without it alright?"

Sam didn't say anything, but a look fell across his eyes, accepting this alternative.

"Okay," Dean lowered Sam's head back down gently. He stood back up, and took off his jacket, rolling up the sleeves on his gray long sleeved shirt. He stepped up on the mattress, placing one foot on either side of Sam's body. He bent down, taking Sam's injured arm in both of his, and brought his right foot down in Sam's right armpit. He found his leverage on the bed, making sure his weight was balanced, or he could hurt Sam even further. "You ready?"

Dean's eyes found his brother, they shared another look. Sam's was forgiving, and Dean's was apologetic.

He pulled up with a hard swift motion on Sam's arm, putting all of his weight into it. Sam screamed, and the scream ripped through Dean like a knife, but he kept pulling, repeating: _I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry._ in his mind until, finally, mercifully, he heard a 'pop' that told him that the joint had been put back into the socket. Dean released Sam's arm carefully to his chest, jumping off the bed.

"Sammy, you with me?" Dean asked.

Sam nodded slowly, not opening his eyes, his face pale from the resetting of his bone. "Thanks."

"Yeah, don't thank me yet dude, sometimes I set these things crooked," Dean ripped another section of the torn sheet, and folded it over into a triangle pattern. "Here we go," Dean gently maneuvered the fabric under Sam's shoulder, resting his arm inside the makeshift sling, tying it off at the top.

Each movement was done with more care than the outside world had ever seen Dean Winchester using. He had always displayed his bad ass side those outside, and there was no doubt, that it was a real side, a strong side, but it was like a mask he wore, to not let anything in to see his vulnerability, to the humanity within. But, he couldn't wear that mask here, as he patched up his broken little brother, he couldn't pretend that these things just rolled off him like water. That he didn't see each wound that had been inflicted on Sam and feel it as a wound of his own. There was no strength when it came to Sam, none, because Sam was his weakness.

Sam hadn't moved at all since Dean set his shoulder. In terror, Dean lowered his head down to his nose, and placed his hand on his chest. He felt the breath on his skin and the beating under the soft cotton of Sam's shirt, he had passed out, but he was still here. Dean felt the terror leave him like stepping out of ice water, but the chill of his fear was still there. Sam was badly hurt, and he still had no idea what the hell happened.

Dean could see the pinky finger on Sam's left hand was bent at an unnatural angle, broken. Dean took his hand in his own, examining the injury. Anger rose in his mouth like bile. "What the hell did they do to you?" He set the break, splinting the finger with a pencil he broke in half and the remaining scraps of bed sheet. Sam's skin was sallow and flushed, Dean felt his forehead, it was cold. He was going into shock. Dean went into the tiny closet sized bathroom, taking the only towel, thin and a hideous yellow, down from the rack, wetting it with tepid water.

He came back to the bed and began wiping Sam's face and neck with the wet towel. "I swear Sam, I'll find the bastards who did this."

The coppery smell of blood was wafting up to Dean's nose. He stopped in his movements, checking over his brother's body, not finding any open wounds, not finding a source for any blood to be coming from. Until he looked down, and saw a stain of blood leaking into the mattress. He jumped back, "What the hell-"

_Did they shoot him? Was he in too much shock to remember?_ Dean slid a hand under Sam's back, feeling for any wetness, but when he slid his hand back out it was dry, and he had felt no gunshot wounds. _Where the hell is this coming from?_ Dean felt again, still finding nothing, until his hand touched the back of the fabric of Sam's jeans. This time his hands came away sticky. The smell of blood was strong. _What the hell did they do, why is he bleeding?_ _Did they cut him, stab him? _Each question was making Dean more and more enraged as he went down the list of injuries these fuckers that hurt Sam could have done. _But why would they stab him so far- _Dean's thoughts suddenly all came to a halt like a truck that had slammed on its breaks just before going over a ravine. He smelled the stain on his hand again, there was blood, the odor was almost overpowering, but there was another smell, fainter, but still there.

His anger rose, it lit itself on fire.

His phone rang on the nightstand, he ignored it the first, second, third time, but after the fifth time it rang he snatched it, flipping it open angrily. "What?"

"I need to talk to you."

Dean instantly recognized the voice, but it was one that he really didn't want to hear right now. "Now's not a good time!"

"Where are you?"

"I'm still in North Carolina-"

"Dean."

Dean jumped at the sound of his name; he glanced down at Sam, even though he knew that wasn't his voice. Sam was still out.

A figure stepped closer to him, one dressed in a rumpled black suit and wrinkled trench coat, his expression stoic, his eyes insurmountably ancient despite the youth of his face. "We need to talk."

"Cas," Dean met the eyes of the angel. "If I said it wasn't a good time, that didn't mean you should Shazam your angel ass over here!" He felt, as he always did when he talked to him, incredibly young, a cub talking to the wisest animal in the forest. But, despite Castiel's other worldly powers, and his unlimitless knowledge, Dean knew that the angel did not feel the way humans felt. So he could not understand the burning, intense emotion that was throbbing in his chest at the audacity of the angel barging into a moment such as this.

Castiel looked down at Sam lying unconscious on the bed, watching his stillness. "Your brother is hurt Dean."

"Yeah, no shit Cas!" Dean snapped. Castiel had become Dean's friend, a soldier who he was proud to fight along. But, right now, all Dean could do was scoff at the dry denseness of such a superior being. "So whatever crap holy network assignment you came here to pull me in on, you can just forget it because I'm not leaving Sam!"

While Dean talked, he was completely unaware that he had risen from the bed, standing protectively between Sam and Castiel, his eyes daring the angel to separate him from his brother. Castiel saw this though, he didn't feel human emotion, pure raw love, but he knew what it looked like.

"I didn't come here to ask anything of you," Castiel responded, every word lacking nothing, no hidden meaning. He didn't hide behind any overtones; he had existed too long in creation to play these kinds of games. "Your branding keeps your location from me, but I can still sense your hurt, it's like a sonar sense. I could feel it from miles away."

"Really?" Dean's returned in disbelief. "Well. That's all really touching Cas, but _none_ of that is helpful right now!" Dean finished his words in a hiss.

Castiel looked over at Sam lying unmoving, repeating his earlier remark, but adding one more word to it: "Your brother is hurt badly Dean."

"Tell me you didn't just zap yourself over here to mock me right now!" Dean was yelling at a being that could smite him into tinder where here stood, but he was so high on anger right now, that he didn't care.

"I can try and heal him," Cas stated quickly, sensing Dean's anger, an emotion, which even he feared.

Dean stared at him, not because of the entire phrase he said, but because of a single word. "What do you mean _try?"_

Castiel didn't speak, but bent down over Sam's body, placing a palm over his forehead, pressing down, his eyes closed, as if in meditation. The bed began to shake with a radiating energy from the angel's hand, but the energy didn't push, it pulled. Sam's body was drawn upwards from the force of it, and Castiel was assaulted by all of Sam's pain, every single moment of it experienced that night.

That energy drew up to the surface of Sam's psyche like blood rising to the surface of a wound, breaking through a weak covering, back out into the air. Sam's eyes suddenly came open, and he screamed. "NO! STOP! PLEASE GOD, STOP IT! PLEASE!" His body started to convulse again, but much fiercer, arching off the bed.

"GET OFF HIM!" Dean grabbed Castiel and threw him back, and off of Sam. When the angel lost his connection with Sam the air cracked around them like hot lighting, flinging him backwards onto the ground, and dropping Sam panting, almost hyperventilating, back down onto the bed.

Cas lay on the floor, stunned, his hands smoking.

Dean ignored the fallen angel completely, holding Sam's head in his hands for another countless time that night. "Sam, it's okay, you're okay!"

"Dean," Sam's eyes were panicked when they met his brothers, like he was trying to dissolve away the aftershock of a terrifying nightmare. "Where am I?"

Castiel picked himself up off the floor; he had no breath, so he wasn't winded. But, the impact of his lost connection left him dazed, like he had fallen from grace only to be yanked back upwards at the last moment.

Dean turned back to glare at Cas. "What did you do to him?" His eyes were murderous.

"Sam's pain is beyond the physical level now. " Castiel told him. "It's reached past that, deeper. I can't heal pain that has gone down this far. All I did was draw it out; it's left his senses confused, disoriented."

"You're safe Sam, alright?" Dean didn't respond to Castiel's remark. "You're back at the hotel room, and you're safe."

"God Dean," Sam dropped his neck back against Dean's hands, his eyes closing again. "I can't- I'm so damn tired-"

"Remember I said I got you Sammy," Dean returned, he laid Sam's head back down on the bed. "You can sleep, okay?" He rested his hand on Sam's forehead, much shorter then Castiel had done, but in that brief moment there was a tenderness that no angel who laid hands on his brother could ever pull off.

Sam's breathing began to even out under Dean's touch. Dean didn't know if he was truly asleep, but the pain lines on his face began to recess. This allowed him to move his mind away from Sam just long enough to glare at the angel standing in front of him.

"Just what were you trying to achieve with your little stunt, huh? You could've killed him!"

"My intentions were not to kill Sam, Dean," Castiel answered, taking a step towards him, a movement to calm a raging storm. "Your brother has suffered a violation tonight. I tried to remove it, but like I said it's beyond my powers now."

"Beyond your powers?" Dean snarled back. "What the kind of angel can't heal one man!"

"It doesn't work like that!" Castiel always had a very low and deep voice. Even when he screamed the pitch stayed deep. It wasn't hard, or uncaring, it was ancient, ancient and tired. "Physical injuries I can heal! But Sam's wounds are beyond that, much deeper. Human emotions are one of the most complex systems in the entire universe! They have evolved even beyond the expectations of God! Physical wounds are minute in comparison; they are merely scratches on a shattered infrastructure!"

"What the hell does all that crap even mean?"

"What happened to your brother tonight has damaged his soul Dean!"

Dean's face drew back in a sudden shock. "His soul?" This wasn't like some Sunday preacher telling him that Sam's soul had been damaged, and a week's worth of church, prayer and home bible study would set on the right path of love and a perfect life. This was someone saying these words that had most likely been present when the first human soul had ever been forged.

"Emotions are the direct link to the soul. The soul is what actually holds man up; bones and sinews have simply grown around them to protect it. There are some violations that pierce through every one of these physical barriers until it reaches it, and spreads like poison. And it's a poison angels can't touch! You saw why my attempt did to Sam. It's because we lack souls Dean!" Castiel was screaming, yelling so loudly that everyone inside the hotel would have heard like a rock concert if Castiel didn't have the ability to alter their perception and make them hear nothing at all but a fierce wind blowing outside and an approaching rainstorm. "Only a creature of soul can heal another that has been damaged. We were told that from the Beginning, but I didn't believe it until I tried it tonight!"

Dean breathed in these words like bad, stale air. "So where does that leave me?" He looked down at his exhausted brother, and back up to Castiel. "You're telling me that I have to heal Sam soul's myself. But, in case you haven't noticed, my soul isn't exactly intact either." The tear that emerged dripped down his face, pattering a single time against the carpet.

"I know," Castiel's voice was now more tired than ancient. If there ever was a time that an angel wanted to have a soul, to feel the emotions he could see on Dean's face, instead of just sensing them, Cas wanted that now. Because, Dean was his friend. "But, you're the only one who can." He vanished like a mirage.

Dean swallowed the choking gasp he felt coming up. He swept the lamp off the nightstand, sending into the wall, the shattering becoming the scream that wouldn't come out. He sat down on the edge of the bed, bringing Sam's left hand up, holding in between both of his, tears running down into both their palms.

xxxxxxxxx

Sam opened his eyes, they took a minute to focus, the room was dark, and he felt exhaustion wanting to pull him back under. But, he fought it off, desperate for once that night to be awake. His dreams had pulled him back into the immediate past so vividly that he wanted reality back.

The room was dark now, the lamp lying shattered and useless on the floor where Dean had flung it. Sam felt a light weight across his body and a firm pressure on his hand. He turned, switching on the lamp set above the bed that Dean had neglected to turn on before and looked, finding the first sensation to be a blanket that was draped across his body, and the second was Dean's hand holding his.

His older brother was passed out in a chair next to the bed, his head pillowed on the arm that wasn't reached out towards Sam's hand. Sam slid his hand from Dean's grasp, using it to brace himself against the bed, pulling up slowly with a wince.

Dean felt the movement, his head raised. He saw Sam watching him. "Sammy," he came completely awake instantly.

"Dean," Sam's throat felt and tasted like stale cobwebs, he tried to clear it away. "What time is it?"

"I don't even know," Dean pulled closer. "But, that's not important. How are you feeling? You hurting bad anywhere?" He felt Sam's forehead like a fever would explain away all that had happened to him that night.

"Dean, I hurt bad everywhere," Sam insisted, he winced again trying to sit back up more.

Dean grabbed his shoulder to still his movements. "Hey man, maybe you should stay down."

"No," Sam hissed pulling up further. "I'm fine."

Dean helped Sam reach a fully sitting upright position. "No you're not," the words were quiet, but not so quiet that Sam couldn't hear them.

The younger Winchester turned his head up to the older one. "What did you say?"

"You heard what I said," Dean returned.

"Okay," there was a pause, a 'gathering your words' moment from Sam. "I'm not fine. I hurt like hell. But, c'mon dude, I've had worse," Sam laughed, dry and tight in his throat, like he had just simply (and it was a testament to the line of work they did for the word "simply" to be valid here.) been attacked by vengeful poltergeist or wendiego that had body slammed him into something hard.

Dean drew a breath, his hand going to his mouth, fingers swiping across the skin on either side of it, a gesture he used when he gathered his words. "How much do you remember about what happened?"

Sam watched Dean watching him. _More then I want to remember Dean. _He watched him harder, and he lied. "Not much. Those two guys who escaped from the police jumped me outside by the soda machine; I remember one of them hit me on the back of the head. I must've gone down pretty hard, because everything else is really hazy after that."

"And that's it?" Dean asked. "Nothing else?"

"Sorry, no," Sam replied, trying to keep his eyes on Dean. When he was little, Dean would approach him with melted army men grasped in his hands, asking if he had anything to do with it. And, Sam would always look anywhere but Dean's face, he could never look straight at him and lie. _I have to lie, Dean. I HAVE to, you can't know the truth._ "I wish I could."

"You _wish_ you could?" Dean's words were angry, but, he tried to keep them level, he didn't want to scream at Sam, not after all he had just learned. "Dude, you were always a terrible liar."

Sam tried to fake innocence as well as lying: "What are you talking about?" He felt his heart beating up into his ears; he just hoped his voice was even. _Dean, don't._

"Cas was here Sam," Dean said, watching his brother lying right to him. No matter why Sam was doing it, the lying hurt. "He came and tried to heal you, but he couldn't."

Sam didn't expect to hear about the angel showing up as an answer to his question. "Cas was here?" He sat up more. "When? Why?"

"Like I said, he tried to heal you Sam," Dean kept to answering only one of the questions Sam had asked, losing the battle on keeping his anger down. "But he couldn't. You want to know why? Because he said what happened to you tonight had damaged your soul! And you're just sitting here pretending you're just peachy about that!"

"He doesn't know what he's talking about Dean!" Sam found his voice again, and was yelling, yelling to do anything to keep Dean from discovering what a terrible liar he really was. "Yeah, I'm hurt, I'm tired, but my soul is fine!"

"Stop lying to me Sammy!" Dean scream was louder then both of them screaming would have equaled combined. He stood up from the chair he had been sitting at, and threw it at the wall, shattering it.

Sam flinched at the sound of the wood breaking beyond all form of repair, pieces falling like splintered wooden rain to the carpet. He watched his brother's chest heaving, in and out, in and out, his eyes digging past every lie Sam was telling him.

"I saw the blood Sam! I saw where it came from! So, I need you to stop dicking around and tell me the goddamn truth! Okay? I deserve that much!"

"That is the truth Dean!" Sam's words came out all at once. "I don't remember, I told you that!"

Dean breathed hard again, pushing down another scream. He grabbed his jacket, throwing it on his body, heading towards the door.

"What are you doing?"

"I can't listen to this anymore." Dean grabbed his car keys from his jacket pocket.

"Dean! Damnit!" Sam slammed his left fist into the nightstand, sliding fragments of the lamp that had fallen there down to the floor. "What? You're just going to walk away? I said I don't remember!" He watched Dean leaving, his thoughts screaming at him to stay, because he _needed_ him to stay. So, he did it the only way he knew how, by finally telling him the truth. He took a breath, the anger suddenly dissolving into mist. "I don't want to remember okay?" his words sounded very far off, like he was talking across a vast empty field instead of across a room. "But I remember, I remember, every second it."

Dean had stopped walking, his hand lowered in its action from reaching for the knob. He turned, facing his brother.

"Those men," Sam bit his lip to make sure nothing escaped him except his words. But, something wet dropped from him anyway, something that wasn't blood, but hurt infinitely more to be let out. "They, dragged me into that room. When I woke up I was tied up, and I was-naked." He flinched on the word, and he watched as Dean flinched from it to. "from the waist down. And I didn't know why, or what the hell they were planning," he laughed, but there was nothing funny to that laugh. "But they didn't let me wait too long to find out."

Dean had come back to the bed, and he sat down beside Sam, placing one hand on his shoulder. "Sam-"

Sam sucked in a breath, drawing in the scream that he didn't want to release, because he didn't want to break apart, to feel so weak, but it didn't work. "I fight monsters, demons, every evil son-of-a-bitch out there, but I couldn't stop two men-"

"Stop it!" Dean insisted. "Okay? This isn't your fault! You fought them off as best you could-"

"I screamed, Dean! But, they didn't stop, it just pissed them off and they did more, they gagged me so no one would hear, and just kept going, they didn't stop once-"

"Sam, enough!" Dean had to stop Sam, even though he needed to hear the truth, it was ripping through him to hear it, like being stabbed in the heart.

"THEY DIDN'T STOP!" Sam's voice finally broke apart into choking sobs, the wounded, beaten sound of something strong being made to break.

There was no hesitation from Dean, no "let's not do chick moments" pauses. He grabbed the back of Sam's neck, pulling him over, arms going around him, holding him. His tears came then, listening to his brother choking on such horrible pain. They were silent, but they were as numerous as Sam's.

Sam dug his hands into Dean's arms, clinging to the only sanity left from that night, in the form of his big brother.

"It's okay Sammy, it's gonna be okay. I promise you. Alright? I'm not gonna let them hurt you again." Dean held onto him tighter, healing his brother's soul the only way he knew how.

xxxxxx

Hours passed, the darkness of the predawn had undergone a metamorphosis, like a butterfly, from a drab gray thing, into the pinks and oranges of a rising sun. It shown through the window despite the closed blinds. The cheap white wall clock ticked above the window, but, the noise was drowned out by hushed talking and pacing footsteps.

Dean was walking back and forth in front of that window, his phone pressed to his ear. "You got the address for those plates I sent you?"

"Yeah," the voice on the other end responded, as the man the voice belonged to moved the strewn papers around on his desk to find the small scrap he was looking for. "The vehicle's registered to a David Roy Cattleman, lives at 13 Hyde Avenue."

"How far is it from where we're at?" Dean asked. He pulled back the dirty blinds to peer out into the hotel parking lot. A police car had come by earlier, but, the greasy little hotel manager had run up to meet the cop. Dean had seen them talking, there had been some gestures from the manager; then a wad of 20 dollar bills were slipped into the officer's hand. Dean saw the young cop contemplating what decision to make, though, in the end he pocketed the money, and headed back to his patrol car. He knew that the cop being bribed to leave was actually the best scenario, because, it kept him from checking into Sam and Dean's backgrounds (they would have been lies, but Dean wouldn't be able to lie as well as he usually did, not now). But, to see the police so ready to turn a blind eye after what happened to his little brother, it galled him.

"Dean, you there?"

Bobby's voice snapped Dean back from his thoughts. "Just give me the coordinates will ya?"

"It's 20 miles south, southwest of the hotel. Place is in the middle of no man's land, no neighbors for miles, only one stretch of dirt road leading up to the property."

"Yeah well, I think it's high time somebody pay a visit to Hillbilly Hideaway."

There was a moment of silence over the line.

"How's Sam doing?" Bobby was the one who broke the silence.

Dean looked over at the bed where Sam was lying asleep. His dislocated shoulder was drawn up to his chest, and it rose and fell with the rhythm of his breathing. His body was tense, even in sleep.

"He's been better," Dean answered. "Thanks for the coordinates. I'll be in touch-"

"Dean," Bobby cut him off. "Don't go and do anything stupid."

Dean laughed, a dry, humorless sound. "You know me Bobby."

"And that's what worries me boy!" Bobby yelled into the phone. "You have too many masochistic wet dreams about getting yourself blown to hell!"

"He's my brother Bobby!" Dean's words were intense, matter-of-fact. "What am I supposed to do?"

"Sam needs you Dean!" Bobby loved these two boys like his own sons. He couldn't let anything happen to either of them. "You won't be any help to him if you're dead!" He only hoped that Dean would see logic. But, even before he finished talking, Bobby knew that he wouldn't. Sam was Dean's blind spot; he never thought logically when it came to him.

"I know he needs me," Dean returned, the tone of a man who knew the weight what he was about to do, but ignored it, because this was about his family. "That's why I'm not letting this slide. I gotta go."

"Dean!-" Bobby shouted, but Dean had already disconnected the call. Bobby started at his phone, and then threw it across the desk, where it knocked over a stack of his papers, sending them raining to the floor. "That ejet's gonna kill me one day!"

Dean held his Beretta in his hands. He slid out the clip, tapping it against the handle of the gun. It hit the metal with a heavy sound, fully loaded with 9mm rounds. He slid the clip back into the gun, cocking the first bullet into the chamber. The gun was then tucked away into the pocket of his leather jacket.

He came away from the window, and stepped over to where the chair he had been sitting at had stood; now lying in wood chips at his feet. He looked down at brother. "Don't worry Sammy, I got this. No bastard is going to touch you and get away with it." It had always been his responsibility to watch out for Sam, but it had stopped being just that a long time ago, it had developed into something else entirely. Just how deep that something was, how his protection of his brother was no longer a job, revealed itself in his next moves: He leaned down, placed a hand on top of Sam's head, and kissed him on the forehead.

"Be right back." Dean turned and walked out of the hotel room.

xxxxxxx

The road known as Hyde Avenue was nothing but a long line of dirt and gravel bordered by tall oak and pine trees on its left, and a sloping hilly cow pasture on its right. A few chocolate brown Jersey Cows had come over to the pasture's barbed wire fence, 'mooing' in curiosity at the black '67 Impala that was billowing up a dust cloud in their faces.

The cows' mooing was becoming too loud for Dean to drive up the road silently. "Come on you uncooked burgers, get away from my car!"

The cows were unfazed by the insult, and more kept coming up to the fence to watch Dean drive by. Thankfully, another fence broke off the pasture from the half acre yard ahead of him. Sitting in the yard's center was a clapboard one story house that had turned gray from age and water damage.

Two huge Chevrolet S10 pickups on monster wheel tires were parked where the road finally ended. Dean parked behind these, climbing out of the Impala, and walking over to the first truck. He raised the hood, disconnecting the battery from the engine block, and removed it. He did the same with the other truck's battery, throwing both into his trunk. "You're not going anywhere, you dicks."

He walked up to the house, three creaking stairs taking him to a wide porch where a black Rottweiler was sleeping under a low window. As Dean approached, the dog raised his head and started viciously barking. The animal didn't lunge, but, the barking completed its goal a few moments later when the front door of the house opened. A face emerged from behind the screen door. One that was more grease then man, with a long mess of stringy brown hair, in a wardrobe of ancient denim and flannel.

"You David Roy Cattleman?" Dean asked.

"Who's asking?" A deeper voice emerged from the recesses of the house. Footsteps creaked on the floorboards, and the screen door was pushed open.

The second man had the same fashion sense as his friend, but he was taller, more built, an ivy vine tattoo trailed around his massive bicep, and he had almost no hair on his head. His shirt was a button up, opened several buttons below what Dean wanted to see.

"Mister Cattleman I presume." Something sterile white peaked out by the shirt's neckline, a thick padding of gauze, one with a soaking of blood at its center.

The man was completely nonplussed about his wound, staring at Dean with the face of someone who was used to being completely arrogant. "Who the fuck are you?"

"I'm part of the county trash collection team," Dean said. "I'm afraid your, lovely yard here, is attracting too many animals because of the smell. We're going to have to ask you to clean up your pile of crap."

The man's lips pulled back into a leer. "You have a smart mouth on you boy." His left arm was hanging down by his side in the darkness, and there was something grasped in it. He raised his hand, leveling Sam's black Vector in front of Dean's face. "See, I already know who you are, never forget faces."

Dean seeing Sam's gun in the man's hands was a catalyst, his mind began flashing like a bad movie. He could hear Sam's screams behind that dirty glare. His jaw clenched, something inside him snapped. And, it wasn't his sanity.

"Then you know already know why I'm here you worthless prick," Dean raised his own gun, a kill shot right to the center of the forehead. "But first, you're going to give me back my brother's gun."

The man's leer grew even dirtier. "Your brother huh? You 'tards are more an abomination then I realized." The leer turned into a disgusting laugh. "Besides, I already gave something to your brother. Limp little dick couldn't even handle it enough to let me finish-"

Dean fired, his shot only missing because the man had fired at the same time and he had to duck to avoid the bullet. But, he recovered his bearings in two seconds and lunged at him, sending them both to the floorboards of the house. He punched him in the face, once, twice, three times, each punch snapping bone and cartilage. "You bitch! You fucking touched my brother!" Another punch splattered blood from the man's broken nose across Dean's face. "I'm gonna kill you!"

Something grabbed him around the waist and slammed him down on the ground. The first man who had come to the door, slammed a fist into Dean's gut, three times in rapid fired succession, hard rounds, choking the air out of him. Dean swung back and kick, his shoes connecting with the man's abdomen, sending him sprawling backwards. Dean ducked sideways from another punch. His jumped back up, his hand on his gun, finger poised on the trigger. "I've been to hell before you worthless piece of shit!" His words were a death omen that even a Reaper would shrink back from. "It's going to be a rest home for you when I get done!"

Something hard slammed into back of his skull. Dizzy, but with the gun still in his hand, Dean turned, only to be met with the butt end of a double barreled shotgun. "Who said we were done?" The deep voice leered as he watched Dean drop to the ground, unconscious.

xxxxxxx

Sam's eyes snapped open, he hadn't had a dream. Something in the conscious world had brought him awake, something he could feel watching him.

"Dean," Sam went with his first, immediate thought. But, when he looked over, it wasn't his brother who was standing there. It was the wrinkly trench coat wearing form of an angel, watching him.

"Castiel," Sam sat up fast, despite how painful it was. "What are you doing here? Where's Dean?"

"That's a good question Sam," Cas said. "I don't know, but I can sense something. Something very bad." He held up a crumpled piece of stationary paper with the name of the hotel printed across the top of it. "I don't know what this means, but I think it's where Dean is."

Sam took the paper from Castiel. On it, in Dean's handwriting, were a series of numbers, each set followed by Cardinal directions. "These are coordinates," Sam didn't know where these coordinates led, not their exact location, but he had a sinking idea. "Cas, did Dean tell you what he was doing?"

"No," Castiel watched as Sam got up from the bed, removing the sling around his arm to yank on his jacket, ignoring the gasped scream the move caused him. He left the sling off. "But I'm assuming you already know what he's doing, otherwise you wouldn't be this upset."

"Upset doesn't cover it Cas!" Sam screamed, he searched around for his gun, only to remember it was still missing, he swore. Opening the nightstand drawer, he took out the five inch long, sheathed Bowie knife that Dean had thrown inside there, tucking it into the waistband of his bloodstained pants. "I gotta find him-"

"Dean took the Impala." Castiel said. "You have no way to get where you're going."

"Then I'll steal a damn car!" Sam yelled right to the angel's face. "I'm not going to let Dean take the fall because of me!"

"He had to go Sam," Castiel said, staring up at him. "It was never an option."

"He's my brother! I don't care what his reasons were; I'm still going after him!"

"He's not your brother Sam."

Sam whirled like he had been bitch slapped by the angel. Dean was a destructive force of nature when he was pissed, but so was Sam, and right now, he was very pissed. "What the hell did you just say to me?"

"Dean Winchester is not you brother."

Sam didn't need a demon to posses him to make his eyes go dark then, he needed his anger. And he had it, and what the angel had dared to say, and he stepped forward with that anger. "You stupid son-of-a-"

"He's your soul!" Castiel shouted at Sam.

Sam's eyes dropped away from anger into bewilderment. "My-"

"Soul mates can exist between siblings too Sam!" Castiel didn't even let Sam finish his short; two word remark, because, what he was telling him, he had known for years. It had been a weapon Heaven and Zachariah had used over the brothers again and again. Castiel had been sworn to secrecy about this fact, but he had been cast out of Heaven, he no longer considered their rules applicable to him. "Dean isn't just your brother! Soul mates aren't like your tacky greeting cards make it out to be; with marriage and dirty sex. It is the single most powerful connection two human beings can ever share between them! Dean did what he did, because your pain was his pain too! You are the rest of him, and he is the rest of you!"

Sam felt like he had fallen dead center into a hurricane, slammed down and up, and flung winded and dazed to land. He knew that in humanity, soul mates were considered lovers. Being called "the rest of someone" was a description you gave to a person you wanted inside your bed, not someone who would be standing next to it, kicking it with his foot telling you to hall ass and hurry the hell up. How many people had thought that Sam and Dean were "together, together" over the years made him nauseous because Dean was his _brother, _they were directly related by blood. Gay love was gay love, but incest, is and always is, incest. (All those fangirls of Chuck's still made Sam cringe.)

But now, he thought back to every moment that Dean had saved him, as far back as he could remember. When he was little, he never considering it unusual to have a big brother who beat up the school bullies to blood and broken bones, because one of them tripped you. Or how, when someone carjacked Dean when he was fifteen, and Dean came back home, scraped up, Sam had tracked the 18 year old down, and beat him repeatedly with a baseball bat at the school until the principal and the police dragged him off. Even, later, when Dean had brought Sam back to life with a deal with the crossroads demon, and Sam had screamed for weeks, standing in that dirt field, for that same demon a year later to bring Dean back from hell, even after all of that, Sam thought nothing of doing such outrageous things for Dean. And, he knew that Dean didn't either. He had always just assumed it was because they were brothers. But, now-

"Tell me how to find Dean Cas."

"Did you not hear a word I said? "Castiel responded. "What you're asking of me is dangerous Sam," "As much as your brother has become my friend, he would take that Sacred Knife and drive it up my throat if anything happened to you."

"You just got through telling me that my brother is my soul mate Cas! And you expect me to sit here and do nothing!"

"It's for your own protection Sam!"

"Screw my own damn protection!" Sam screamed, finding his voice, because he had found his reason too. "He bleeds, I bleed! There's no time for me to do fucking research and find out where he went! So, you either tell me where to find Dean, or I swear to you, I'll ram that Sacred Knife up your throat myself!"

"I don't know where Dean is," Castiel responded, he couldn't stop Sam's anger, he knew it, so he didn't try. "Believe me Sam, I wish I did. Nobody understands more than me exactly what Dean is to you."

"Then help me find him! Please!" Sam was still dangerously angry, but he couldn't help the pleading that struck his voice. How many times had he been right here, yelling for someone to tell him where to find Dean? And, Sam suddenly realized, that this was a soul mate truly was- feeling this person down to their bare essence, and screaming for them if you couldn't, because you couldn't live without them.

"The markings on your ribs keep you both hidden from me," Castiel could see Sam's frustration when he said that. His gaze was so angry and so desperate. He would either jump him or break apart, and Castiel knew Sam was done breaking apart. "But, maybe there's another way." He reached into the pocket of his trench coat and pulled something from it. He held it up in front of Sam.

Sam stared in disbelief at something he hadn't seen in months. Something he watched Dean throw in the trash in another hotel like this one.

"Your bond with Dean was there since birth, but it was truly forged when you gave him this." Castiel was holding up leather necklace with the silver pendant on it that Sam had given to Dean for Christmas back when he was 9, and Dean was 13. "If you take it now, it might be able to remove the protection I place on you, override it just enough for you to find him."

Sam took the necklace from Castiel, feeling its lightweight in his hand, such a small thing. Without hesitation placed it around his neck.

"Understand that I cannot intervene any more after this Sam. I told Dean that he alone could save you, and it is the same for you to save him. This is a law I cannot break, even if I wanted too, it's the same kind of law that governs the winds to blow strongly when a storm approaches-"

"I'm doing this Cas," Sam cut into the angel's explanation. "So shut up, and show me how damn this thing works."

Castiel stepped closer to Sam, looking up at him. "It works like this." He raised his hand like he had done earlier that night. "Good luck Sam."

Sam felt the feather weight touch on his forehead before a white blinding light engulfed him, and he felt himself leave where he was standing.

xxxxxxx

_Bend your knees._

Sam heard this in his head in Dean's voice, as clear as the day Dean had told him this the first time. He felt his feet hit the ground hard, his body absorbing the shock of a different place than he had been at two seconds earlier.

He was standing in the middle of a field, green with patches of brown from where the grass had died. A brown and white cow was staring at him over a gate that blocked him from where he was standing.

Sam swept his eyes around; he saw a dirty looking old wooden house with two trucks parked in front of it, and behind these huge monstrosities, a dirt splattered 1967 Impala.

"Dean!" Sam ran across the field, up to the house, jumping over the railing of the wraparound porch. He ducked under a long two-foot high window, peering in through, of all things, white Chantilly lace curtains. _Glad to see stupid assholes like pretty things._

The house was dark; he could see a wardrobe, and half of a mounted giant flat screen TV, but nothing else. He shifted his weight higher to try and look inside from a different angle.

Something loaded cocked behind his head, and the barrel of a shotgun pressed there a second later.

Once again Sam couldn't turn when heard the deep voice: "You just can't seem to stay away, can you pretty boy?"

xxxxxxx

Dean's head was pounding, but he had been concussed so many times, hell, he had been hung over so many times, that he was used to this kind of pain. His was sitting on one of the filthiest floors he'd ever seen (and there were a lot of filthy hotels he had been at to compare this too.), back against the wall, hands and feet tied, trussed up like a Christmas turkey.

On his right side was an iron framed bed with a filthy mattress. Next to this bed was a round wooden table with two dime store quality folding chair around it. Sitting at one of these chairs was the skinny grease and plaid wearing man. He was using a black stained rag to polish the body of Sam's black Vector. Dean's silver Beretta was there too, lying on the table top, waiting its turn to be handled by someone it didn't belong too.

"You know, I'm gonna need those back."

"I'm afraid I can't do that," the man didn't look up from his polishing. "I could never afford two such nice weapons like these. Especially this one here," he caressed the Vector's metal body. "So smooth and easy to cock. Just like its owner."

Dean struggled to break from his ropes. "You shut your mouth!"

"Why?" The man looked up then, standing up from his chair, Sam's gun grasped in his hand. He walked over towards Dean. "Does it make you angry to hear about what an easy slam job he was?" He knelt right next to Dean, the gun held lazily at his side, like he had decided that he had all day to shoot him, so he could take his time to do something else. "You know he screamed the entire time? Like some weak little pussy? It got so bad my buddy had to gag him, but he still wouldn't shut up-"

"You stupid son-of-a-bitch!" Dean struggled harder. "I'm going to rip you're a new one that goes clear up to your eyes!"

The man laughed at this. "Wow, you think a lot of yourself don't you boy? You're not as pretty as that alleged 'brother' of yours, but I've made due with worse," he turned Dean's face towards him with the barrel of the gun. "I just enjoy breaking what needs to be broken."

The screen door slammed, causing the man too look up and over into the only other room in the house. "What is it?"

The deep voiced man entered, pushing a tall figure in front of him, shoving the other into the room. Dean couldn't see who it was for only half a second, but then, instantly, he did. His lips began to say his brother's name, but Sam beat him too it.

"Dean-" Sam saw the man standing beside Dean, but he didn't care, he moved forward.

Two guns moved at the same time, the shotgun trained on Sam, and Sam's own weapon, trained on Dean.

The skinny man laughed. "Well isn't this like an early Christmas present?" He stood up from beside Dean, but kept the weapon on him. His eyes turned to the deep voice, otherwise known as David Roy Cattleman.

"Found him wandering around outside," David Roy said this like he had found a stray dog hiding under his porch. "Apparently, he came back for that one; don't know how he found out where he was-"

"You didn't tell him did you?" the skinny man snapped. "You like to shoot your mouth of sometimes-"

"Like I said I don't know how Jersey!" David Roy snapped back, calling the skinny man by his actual name. They were cousins, cousins who had grown up here for 15 years, and had been bored kids when they had shot someone running across their field to quell their boredom, and liked how seeing him fall felt.

"Fine then," Jersey looked Sam up and down, like he was appraising a strip of meat that had been held up in front of him by a butcher. "No matter, it actually solves my dilemma about what to do. I hate settling for one taste," he stared down at Dean, then back over to Sam, watching him for much, much longer. "When we so preferred another."

Sam felt each moment of the stripping look Jersey gave him, but this time he could turn around and look back. "Let him go you son-of-a-bitch!"

Jersey laughed like Sam was a child who had asked him to make the sun turn purple for fun. "Wow, I never knew you had a mouth on you boy! Wished you were this hot under the collar before-"

"Let him go now!" Sam screamed again.

"Sam!" Dean shouted, it was an order for Sam to shut up, because he could see where those men's interests were really at, and it wasn't about him, it was all about his brother.

"Sam and Dean huh?" Jersey tested out their name like good wine for someone who actually liked cheap beer best. "Glad to meet you both. But, _Dean,_ I'm sorry-" Jersey stepped closer, lowering the gun to Dean's face. "I'm gonna have to kill you now-"

Sam lunged forward, but Jersey cocked Sam's gun to Dean's temple, an action he had been waiting to do for the effect of terror. "Uh uh. I've been shooting since I was in diapers kid, I can kill him faster than it takes you to even think about moving. But, I don't really want to redecorate so early in the season, so maybe I'll make you a deal-"

"I'm going to kill you first you dick!" Sam shouted. "You understand? I'm. Going. To. Kill. You!"

"Now just cool yourself. You haven't even heard my counter yet. You ran, Sam, you ran before we got the chance to finish. And my mother always said to finish what I started-"

"I'm not the one who ran you useless-"

Jersey pulled a penknife from his shirt pocket with his free hand and brought the tip of down into Dean's hand, an inch down through the flesh. Dean screamed. "JUST SHUT UP AND LISTEN!" He brought out the knife as Dean panted from the stab wound.

Sam lunge was only held in check because he was stalemated. The gun's maw was pressed right against Dean's head. Any movements towards his knife would send Jersey's hand to the trigger and send a bullet through Dean's brain.

"Let us finish this," Jersey was speaking like he was talking about eating dinner, or a game of checkers. "You let me and David Roy finish with you, and the back of Dean's head here doesn't end up all over this wall."

Sam couldn't think anymore, his mind was screaming. But the screaming was only about one thing, Dean with the gun to his head, his brother's death so near, and his ability to stop it. No matter what that meant for him.

"Okay." Such casual words, but Sam felt their weight like rocks, but he carried the weight, because he didn't have a choice.

Jersey held a hand up to his ear, like he had misheard. "What was that?"

"Yes, damnit! You heard me!" Sam's voice was almost whisper, but it was in no way weak.

"Sam!"

"Good decision," Jersey said over Dean's outcry.

"But you have to let Dean go first."

"Sam! No!" Dean screamed at his brother. "Damnit, don't you dare, you hear me!" What Sam was bargaining was out of the question for Dean. Nothing about Dean's life was worth that to him.

"Not until after, darling little Sammy," Jersey said, pushing the gun's maw deeper into Dean's skull. "Otherwise, I lose my leverage, and you could run right out that door."

Sam stared over at his brother, tied up on the floor. He felt his heart beating under the silver pendant resting on his chest. His gaze pieced right through Dean's, he could feel it come back to him. "I'm sorry Dean, I have to-"

David Roy grabbed Sam by the back of his neck and hauled him backwards. "You've got all day to act like a woman boy, save some." Sam still resisted, still fought, because it wasn't in him not to fight, but David Roy was stronger, he had done things like this before. He shoved Sam against the wall, winding him.

"SAM!" Dean was now bucking against his bonds, the gun against his head be damned.

David Roy yanked Sam back again before he could recover and slammed him down onto the iron bed on his stomach. He climbed on top of him, straddling him like a horse. "Bleeding Sammie?" he observed the blood on Sam's jeans. "You really are a tight ass aren't you?"

"LEAVE HIM ALONE YOU SON-OF-A-BITCH!" Dean was screaming so loud it was popping his ears. "I SWEAR, IF YOU TOUCH HIM AGAIN I'M GOING TO TORCH YOU BOTH ALIVE!"

"After Dean, after," Jersey mocked. "Everything will come after." Dean was the king of the deadpan, but Jersey had a manic way about his version. "Besides, if you keep screaming, you won't be able to watch properly."

"YOU FUCKING BASTARD!" Dean was screaming both at Jersey, and at David Roy. He was now trying to break the bones in his wrists to get out of the ropes; he was not going to be forced to just sit here and watch these men rape his brother, not while he was still breathing, not even after he stopped.

Sam smelt the semen from David Roy pooling on his jeans, felt the rough hand of the man going to the waistband of his pants. "Don't worry Sammie, this will only hurt a lot. I know how you like it like that."

Sam's arms were pinned underneath him, his right arm throbbing from the dislocation that was starting to slip out again. His left hand arm though, he moved, slid it until it was free. He felt David Roy make a move to pin it back down, but this time, Sam was quicker. His hand found the hilt of the knife at his back. He drew it and stabbed up hitting through flannel, and into flesh.

David Roy reared up in a scream, blood pouring down his chest like a fountain, the knife moving with the pulsing of his heart. Sam turned around and yanked the knife out of the man's chest. "Only one person can call me Sammy, you goddamn trash, and it isn't you!"

"Dave!" Jersey screamed, watching his cousin fall in a bleeding mess to the carpet. His eyes glared in murder at Sam. "Fine, Sam, fine! You want to break the rules? Game over then!" He squeezed the Vector's trigger; the blast of a gunshot tore through the house.

The bullet hit the television, the aim thrown off because of the knife blade piercing Jersey's gut from Sam's accurate aim on it. He grabbed at it, blood leaking out of his mouth. Dean raised his bound feet and kicked Jersey over, right in his wound. Jersey screamed and slumped to the side.

"That's from both of us, prick. Enjoy hell!"

Both men were no longer moving, lying in pools of their own blood on the wooden floor. The silence after such a huge amount of violence was like its own noise.

Sam's arm was barely hanging in its socket now, his breathing was a series of pants. But, he wasn't hearing or feeling it as he moved across the floor to his brother.

"Dean," Sam undid the ropes around Dean's hands and feet, throwing them on top of Jersey's unmoving body.

"Sammy," Once Dean's hands were free he grasped the back of Sam's neck, observing, checking. "Are you-"

"Yeah," Sam answered. "You?"

"Yeah." Dean's answer mirrored Sam's. "Maybe ask me again after a fifth of whiskey though."

Maybe here, two other people, two other brothers, would have hugged. One might even think that two legitimate soul mates would do this. But Sam and Dean didn't. Instead Sam held out his arm for Dean to grab, and his brother took it, pulling himself up back on his feet, saying when he was on them once again:

"Nice aiming Tonto. Let's get out of here."

Sam looked down at all the carnage at his feet, all the blood. He didn't feel righteous, or holy, like he had righted something. He did what he had to do, and it had left its mess.

"Sam? " Dean grabbed his left shoulder, coaxing him into moving. "Dude, C'mon."

Sam turned in the direction of the pressure and walked out of the room with Dean, and back outside of the house.

XXXXXXXXX

Breathing.

Dean Winchester heard it every day of his life. It was what you did to stay alive; but it wasn't a focus of his life. Until now; when he heard it pounding in his ears; walking away from carnage he had created. Walking, not running, because Dean had to reset his busted shoulder quickly, standing in a mess of someone else's blood, because his brother was coming off his adrenaline high, and walking was all he was able to do.

But, it wasn't all the Impala was able to do. Once the brothers were both inside, Dean leveled the gas pedal to the floor, sending half of the dirt road billowing up under the tires. He drove, taking the car back onto the paved main road where skeletal phone wires cropped up alongside the asphalt like trees.

Dean took this road a good ten miles away from the house; then pulled the car alongside a shoulder with a low storm ravine and a small growth of pine trees.

"You doing okay?" Neither one of them had spoken during the previous minutes of driving; Dean's words broke this. He looked at his brother critically; there was no time to make sure of anything before they fled the house. There would be no calling the police; they seemed to be so corrupt in this town that they wouldn't see any of what Sam and Dean had done as self defense.

"I'm okay Dean," Sam was leaning his head against the side door of the car, eyes closed.

"Really? Cause you look like crap." Dean corrected. He reached his hand towards Sam. "What about your head-"

Sam slapped his hand away. "Dude, stop acting like my girlfriend, my head is fine." He closed his eyes again, only to snap them open a second later when he felt a slap on the side of his head.

"How about now?" Dean asked, lowering his hand, staring at him. "Does it hurt now?"

Sam turned to his brother, rubbing the side of his head where Dean just hit him. "Dean, what the hell?"

"That is the _dumbest_ stunt you've ever pulled! You could've gotten yourself killed!" The closed windows made Dean's anger echo, lashing through to Sam.

"They weren't going to kill me Dean!" Sam retaliated, his voice just as loud. "They were going to kill _you_! I couldn't just stand by and watch that happen!"

"Oh, and you think I could just stand by and watch you offer yourself up as jailbait!" Dean yelled back. Yelling at Sam was all he could do right now; because he didn't want Sam to value his life if it meant losing his own.

"What was I supposed to do Dean, just let that psychopathic dick shoot you?"

"YES!" Dean screamed so loud he startled even himself. "Goddamnit Sam! My life isn't worth that to me!" He found himself focusing very intently on his breathing right now, in and out, hard, gasping, trying to find air because his anger had swallowed it.

The car was electrified, hard wired by the emotions that were now inside it. It was like a tripwire, one that would be set off if either one of them added another amount of heat to it.

But Sam didn't care.

"It's worth something to me." He could see Dean, watched his eyes ready to retaliate with an emotion he hadn't decided what shape to give it yet. He pushed open the car and climbed out onto the brown, drying grass before Dean could bring that emotion to life.

It was like an instinct, neither one of them remained in the car when the other vacated. Dean stepped out of his door, and walked to the other side of the car.

Sam whirled on him. "You don't give two shits about your life Dean, fine! But _I_ do! And, I'm not, just going to stand back and watch someone hurt you if I can stop it!"

"You think I could live with myself with you sacrificing that much for me Sam?" Dean was now right up in Sam's face, his younger brother towered over him; tone in his voice reached past that height. "That I wouldn't look at you every day for the rest of my life and feel this huge hole tearing at my gut because of what you did because of me?" the pitch in Dean's voice was angry, but if it were to be stripped away, there would be nothing but a haunting sadness.

"It doesn't matter," Sam said, even with his height advantage over Dean, he always felt shorter when his older brother stood up to him like this with his anger. "I meant what I said before Dean, I had to do it!"

"Don't try to justify this Sam-"

"You were going to go in there and kill them because of me, and you're telling me not to justify what _I_ was going to do!-"

"That is not the same thing and you know it!"

"No Dean! Damnit! It's exactly the same thing!" this time, Sam wasn't going to let Dean win. He grabbed at his head with his good hand, wanting to scream at Dean, to scream loudly, to not care what it meant afterwards, because he didn't know what else to do. And he did: "You're my fucking soul!" Sam would have chosen better words if he had the time to think of them.

"Don't you get it?" No, Sam's words weren't perfect, but they were his, they were the honesty of the moment. And, that's what Sam needed, because they were real. "I had to! I don't care what it costs me, I don't care if you think this is a load of chick crap, but, if you would've died in there Dean, then, I would've died too!"

Dean watched Sam for the longest time, silent, absorbing all that he had just heard, a minute passed, two minutes, still he said nothing.

Sam took Dean's silence, 26 years, of knowing Dean made him well aware of what the silence meant. Sam didn't say anything, he had shouted to the heavens and every angel out there had heard what he had to say, there was nothing else, he was spent. He turned to get back inside the car.

"Sam," Dean's arm blocked Sam from moving.

The younger man turned back to face the older one.

"You're right. Even though I know some of those words were Cas's-" Dean saw Sam roll his eyes slightly despite trying to remain emotionless. "You're right. When you told me what those two dicks in there had done; and when I saw them trying to do it again. I wanted to kill them. I _had _too. Choice never even came up in the matter. It's like you said, you bleed, I bleed. I don't know if that's soul or not; but I do know you; and that's something I will always fight like hell for."

Sam was silent, he wasn't trying to not cheapen the "moment"; he truly had nothing left to say, and the same was true for Dean. They both had been labeled a long time ago as each others' weakness. And, time and time again, it was proven to be true; the lengths they would go to save each other. There was never a line, there was only them, calling out for each other, pulling to reach the other across the void.

"Here," Sam removed the necklace, holding it up in front of Dean. "I think you dropped this a while back."

Dean reached for the necklace, letting it fall into his palm. He remembered very distinctly when he had let it slide from his hand, into the useless paper that filled the garbage can; his faith in his brother being tossed away with it. But, the last 48 hours had reminded Dean, that you can be angry, you can be hurt, you can be pissed as hell. But, there are things you can never throw away, because they are a part of you.

Dean fingered the pendant on the necklace, hearing 9-year-old Sam's voice in his head when he gave it to him, all those years ago. "Cas?"

"Cas," Sam said in agreement.

"We seriously need to get that nerdy angel laid if he spends all his free time digging through hotel garbage."

Sam laughed, a small one, but the first real one in days. "Yeah."

Dean held out his hand to Sam, "Thanks Sammy."

Sam looked at Dean crooked, because of the outstretched hand, like he either wanted him to shake it, or give him a 'fist bump' slap. Sam chose to act on his second instinct, because, he didn't just meet Dean yesterday, he wasn't going to shake his hand like did.

Dean slapped hands with Sam, but he kept a grasp on Sam's hand, and pulled it with his, into a hug.

And Sam hugged him back.

The clearing hummed softly with the wind blowing through the tall grass, the birds watched, a few twittering aloft in the highest branches of the trees. But, no human voices came. The words were there, the emotion behind them present. But, they were expressed in the true style of Sam and Dean; in a gesture, that spoke louder than any words ever could.

Dean released his brother; one hand removing itself from Sam's shoulder, than the other. He was still holding onto the necklace. He unwound the cord from his fingers, sliding it back up over his neck.

"Come on Soul Brother. Let's hit the road."

Sam rolled his eyes again, but not for very long, as he looked at Dean. He turned to climb back into Impala.

Dean did the same on the other side, the door of the car shutting behind him. He started the car, turning on the radio; pulling back out onto the road; moving through the trees, and drove.

Both Sam and Dean had no idea where they were headed, or what their next move was; but it wasn't because they had stopped caring about all of that; they were still hunters after all. They had just placed their certainty back where it should have been all along, in something more important.

_Now I am calling, hoping you'll hear me. _

_We all need somebody, to believe in something. _

_And I won't fear this, when I am falling. _

_We all need somebody, that can mend, these broken bones._

XXXXXXXXXXX

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the end of my first Supernatural Fic. Hopefully, I managed to draw emotions out of those that read it, made you feel something. Cause, believe you me, I had _a lot_ of emotions writing it. I'm afraid there isn't much "Supernatural Magic" in the story (well except for Cas) But, I wanted a story that focused on Sam and Dean's relationship, on what they really mean to each other. I don't believe in "Wincest" at all, but, I honestly and truly feel that they are each other's soul mates, and this is how I feel it would reveal itself.

The lyrics at the end of this are from Rev Theory's "Broken Bones" go listen to it, it gave a lot of inspiration in me writing this.

Please drop me a review if you loved it, even if you hated it, I want to hear from you. I'm proud of this, either way.

Peace

Mystic


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